Every now and then, I like to dust off the ol' grey cells with a more challenging mental contortion. You know—when slaughtering hoards of zombies or jumping from platform to floating platform becomes too monotonous (and young as I am, I can still appreciate just how ridiculous that statement sounds). Sometimes, I just have to give colorful characters and gripping storytelling a break and get down to some real problem solving. Few games can truly test the fortitude of my formidable problem-solving capabilities, which border on Einsteinian. Haha, I'm kidding, you'll probably beat this next game way faster than I did.

Following the original, Take Something Literally 2, by Benoit Freslon, continues in the footsteps of its predecessor, delivering 25 mind-churning, browser-busting puzzles. The setup is pretty straightforward; puzzles are arranged in rows of increasing difficulty. One star means the puzzle is a little annoying. Two stars will give you a headache. Three stars... well, you can extrapolate from there. Each puzzle presents you with a separate screen and a title which will be the key to figuring out how to solve the puzzle. And believe me, this can get pretty tricky, so you may be tempted to get some outside help. But hey, you're not a cheater, right? Walkthroughs are for wussies! (Note: Not actually for wussies!) In case you get stuck but don't want to get beaten up by your fellow gamers for being a dirty cheater, just look for the light bulbs hidden throughout the levels. One bulb will earn you one tip on a level, though sometimes these hints are almost as enigmatic as the puzzles themselves. Gee, thanks, Benoit! These little light bulbs are well-hidden, enough so that finding each one adds another level of satisfying challenge.

Analysis: What can I say? Take Something Literally 2 lives up to its title and often requires you to think a little harder than you might on your lunch break. I've touted the value of out-of-the-box thinking before, but it's particularly useful with the minimalistic presentation style and the various forms of solution inputs, like clicking, typing something in or reaching a destination. Some of the solutions become apparent after a minute or two, while others are (sometimes MUCH) more obtuse. In fact, one of the problems that plagues these kind of puzzle games is that you are often trying to do what the designer thought made sense at the time. The problem, of course, lies in the fact that you may not make the same mental connection between the title and the solution that the designer did during beta testing. Take Something Literally dodges this bullet narrowly because of its relatively high accessibility, but one or two puzzles require a certain amount of familiarity with the designer's work. If you played the original, though, you will be used to this sort of thing.

The whole appeal of the TSL series is the challenge. It is not found in the monochromatic presentation or the canned "reward" for each puzzle solved. You will, however, experience some "ah-HAH!" moments, particularly when... well, I hesitate to say too much, lest I be flayed for spoiling. So just go give it a shot, okay? The reward for each puzzle may be a little... 3 years ago, but we all know the REAL satisfaction that comes from this type of game is knowing you totally didn't use that walkthrough or ask anyone for help in the comments, right?

Walkthrough for first four levels:
I only played to this point before it all felt too hard. Maybe someone with tenacity and smarts can play some more and write a walkthrough. I'd be really interested in one for the rest of the game...

Simon Says

Click where the arrows are pointing, first outside the game then inside. You'll need to click a few times.

Don't Release

When you first click in this level, hold the mouse button down until the LoL Cat appears.

Email

Send an email to [email protected] A reply will come through almost immediately, with an assurance that your email address will not be used for anything, nor will you receive any email from Benoit. The password you receive is:

hello world!

Send Me Hello
Like Miles O'Toothpaste said, this one was like work.

Create a new text document with just the word:

hello

and submit it. Retrieve the password once the download link becomes active

Wow--talk about failing badly. The person doing this does know that some features like Zoom aren't available in some Flash setups, right? (Mine seems to be inconsistant--sometimes I get Zoom in the context menu, other times, like when trying to play this game, I get just an option for 'settings'. I think it depends on which version of Flash is called for--it seems like if the file itself is for an older Flash version it'll work fine, but if it's for Flash 10 it'll only give the settings menu). Not to mention the puzzles depending on external features--such as requiring e-mail or files are a bad idea in general. :-/

Just take a screenshot, and cut out a spot of the pink color. Copy and paste it in the top left corner and keep making it bigger or cut the picture down in size. Just make sure the whole thing is that color and then save it and upload it.

I got very into this game(solving more than half the levels) before hitting the comments section here for help on level 4. Despite doing exactly what the walkthrough says,

the game won't accept my hello.txt file, containing only hello in the body. I also tried sending a file named just hello as the walkthrough technically stated(not hello.txt, just hello with no extension), and that didn't work either.

I can only assume it's a fault of my operating system(ubuntu hardy heron), and how the text file is coded. Very disappointing...I feel as if the time I spent was wasted because I can't win the game. It seems that other people running linux and mac are having similar difficulties. You should add a warning to the review about that level, or at least remove the macwinlinux tag, since it seems that the game may only work under certain operating systems.

Uggh. Why do these games always fall from "clever riddles" to "how well do you know your computer?" I understand that the creators want to work with the medium, but really, between games like notpr0n requiring that you Photoshop multiple background layers or whatnot to screwing around with your webcam on this one... it's really not accessible, or particularly clever, to anyone who ISN'T a game designer. [/peeve]

That being said, it seems cute and well made, if not well thought out.

EDIT: Yeah, it seems to be a hit counter. Or just a unique number counter.

I took the code it generated for me and used it to get my wife in to the party, then I added one to it and got myself in that way. When she tried to invite me, it gave her the same code *I* gave her. Which makes me think it's counting based on IP address. Or partial IP address, anyway.

A warning for Level 23, for people who have to do it "the long way" because they can't adjust their system clocks:

You have to actually leave the game open for the entirety of the level if you're going to finish it in real-time. I gave the baby the pacifier, then closed the level, did other things, came back and gave the man his shoes, closed the level again, finished the rest of the game, and came back to give the old man his cane--and did not get a level-complete dancing kitty. Furthermore, unless you can adjust your system clock, closing the level after the baby leaves baby-phase renders the level unwinnable, so far as I know--unless, after a much longer period of time, the man dies and the level resets. He was still alive at 70 minutes/years.

Have level 15 open in one window, and open up another window with the game, and go to level 15 in that window as well. Now press the Invite button in the first window, and the Join button in the second, then put in the code into the second window. That's how I got through that level, even though I was only at one computer.

adjust my computer clock. the person changes, but the games just hangs and i couldn't pick up the objects.

Its kind of disappointing, i was so looking forward to this game. There's just too many external elements and those vary between different os and browsers. It would have been better if there were less external elements.

I read the walkthrough! Make a new tab, open the armor link page, click the key, click the game tab, click the heart. okay, okay, I got the click the key thing, and so the key is following me in its window, but I can't seem to get the key to my original game tab to solve the game! any help?

search for key to my he4rt, click the link to armor games. Then INSTEAD of clicking the picture of the key right away, click the button below it saying play Take Something Literally 2. A tab will automatically pop up. Then, you choose level 13 in the new tab.Look back at the "key" tab and click the key. Click the new Take Something game tab...and then move your mouse to the keyhole. It worked for me!

At first I was like "oh yay! A nice little puzzle game to keep me occupied for 15 minutes!" No. -_- I do not want to send you an email, create files, google things, invite my friends, and take screenshots all to just complete a level.

Okay, this is going to be HARD!!! THINGS WILL MESS UP!!! I actually DO NOT suggest attempting this game with something earlier than an '07 PC. And AdamC?

I cheated. I went on a website that has the youtube walkthrough with the game. It opened in a smaller but separate window and I just played it until the question I was on, got the info, paused it, sovled the puzzle, and moved on. Pathetic, I know.

I enjoyed the cat that told you you either completed the level or failed. It was cute ;). Also, every 5 levels you complete there is a present which is actually a video clip of, I think, Benoit, or someone else. I don't speak french, so I had no idea what they were saying that wasn't subtitled.

While these vids are some pretty funny material, they are a HUGE temporary download along with the game itself. You just CAN'T use an older computer and expect it to work. I dunno what they have in France, but it must be more advanced then American stuff. Sorry Apple.

The game itself is argueably even more challenging than the last one. Like in the review, look for the light bulbs (if you don't want to cheat like me).

As I said, there is a complete walkthrough on youtube, and for level three, if you dont feel secure about giving someone/thing your email, the password is...

hello world

(okay I hope I did the spoiler right). Ask me (for now, "Muse") for any help! ;) Good luck!

Open textedit, write "hello" (minus quotes). Go to format menu click make plain text, go to save as, choose western-windows-latin-1 for format. save and upload.
It's a shame it's this complicated - the developer should have written it better,

for those in linux

not sure how to do it exactly, but you need to use gedit or similar to save in western windows ISO format instead of UTF. Complicated I know.

If you're on Linux or Mac OS X (or any other UNIX-like system) level 4 might not work because some text editors append LF to the last line. Try using a hex editor to type only hello, or use some editor like gedit.

Go back to level 6.
Click on mouse, then exit to main menu.
Go to level 22 and cat does same thing as he does in level 14.
Thats what the tip means by something missing next to your keyboard: theres no mouse on the keyboards in that level

another thing:
for those who leave their party number on forums or blogs, unless you keep the game open, it wont work because you get a new code each time you play it.
Where are the lights?
I got 22/25.

LEVEL 24!!!!!
go to paint, make a completely pink box, save. Go to game level, click level, click that you have no camera, go to your pictures when the file opens and click on the completely pink pic. That's all :)

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